This book captures the most exciting advances in the harnessing of space as a global resource. The authors track the growing number of space businesses and opportunities for investors, and the many possible benefits of spaceplanes, space stations and even space colonies. The authors also discuss the need for more regulatory reform.

Companies like Planetary Resources are now forming to find mineral-rich asteroids and bring back new riches to Earth. Solar power satellites in the next few years will start to beam clean energy back to Earth, to meet the growing demands of a still-developing world.

Innovative space industries are vital to the survival of modern human life, and the authors demonstrate what can be done to encourage the growing of the "New Space" frontier. From lassoing and then mining asteroids to developing new methods of defending the planet from space hazards and setting up new hotels and adventures for tourists in space, this new industry will have profound effects on Earth, especially on its economy.

This book is based on a study of international experts commissioned ahead of the UNISPACE+50 meeting, having distilled the results of this comprehensive fact-finding process into a compact and very readable form. It can serve as an excellent starting point for understanding all the activities underway or planned to make space truly our next frontier.

Dr. Joseph N. Pelton, currently serves as a member of the Executive Board of the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety. He is the former Chairman of the Board of Trustees and Vice President and Dean of the International Space University as well as the Director Emeritus of the Space and Advanced Communications Research Institute (SACRI) at George Washington University. Dr. Pelton also served as Director of the Accelerated Masters of Science Program in Telecommunications and Computers at the George Washington University from 1998 to 2005. Dr. Pelton was the founder of the Arthur C. Clarke Foundation and remains as the Vice Chairman on its Board of Directors. Pelton is a widely published and award winning author with over 40 books written or co-authored or co-edited with colleagues. His book Global Talk was nominated for a Pulitzer and won the Eugene Emme literature award. Dr. Pelton is a full member of the International Academy of Astronautics, an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and a Fellow of the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS). He was the Founding President of the Society of Satellite Professional International (SSPI) and a member of the SSPI Hall of Fame. He has served as President of the Comsat Alumni and Retirees Association (COMARA). Until recently he was as President of the International Space Safety Foundation. He received his degrees as follows: BS from the University of Tulsa, MS from the New York University and his doctorate from Georgetown University.